Traitorous Attraction. C.J. Miller
as she could tell, nothing had been broken.
Her stomach was against his face. As she slid down his big body to get her feet on the ground, the friction between their bodies burned through her. She wove her arms around his neck to gain her balance. He set her down and his arms lingered around her. “Are you injured?” he asked.
The eye contact set off a tiny shower of sparks between them. “I’m fine. I think I lost my job, though.”
“Those are the stakes. The moment you pursued this course of action, you put your job on the line. Smart woman like you, you must have considered that.”
He’d worked for Sphere. He knew what it took to separate from them and the consequences if the separation was not amicable.
Kate’s stomach knotted with worry. She had considered it, but facing the reality was harder than she’d expected. Her home, her car, her bills and her reputation were at risk because of one decision she’d made. Refusing to turn back now, she forced the negative thoughts away. Her career wasn’t as important as a man’s life, and for the next several days or weeks, however long it took to find Aiden, she would stick to their plan.
Connor released her and Kate grasped his upper arms to steady herself. “Would you have left me behind if I’d been caught?” she asked.
“Would you have stayed behind if you knew it could save your career?” he asked.
“I jumped, didn’t I?” She’d made a clear choice.
His brow lifted. Had she earned a sliver of his respect? “Let’s move. They’ll get through the barricade soon enough.”
He hadn’t answered her question. He’d made it clear he didn’t trust her, but could she trust him?
The airfield encircled the terminal. With the openness of the layout, she and Connor had few places to hide. The garden surrounding the building was filled with drab green bushes, sparse in some areas, overgrown in others.
“Stay close to me,” Connor said.
At the moment, it was the safest place to be. Kate wasn’t trained to avoid Sphere agents or survive an altercation with them.
They crept along the side of the building. Though Connor tried to hold them from her, bush branches scraped at her face, arms and legs as they hurried. “This can’t be just about Aiden,” Connor said.
Kate took the branch he was holding and slipped past it. “If we find him, it would look bad for them, like they left a man in danger.”
“They have enough staff working to keep their name out of the media through threats or force. I don’t think they’d go through this trouble to stop us from finding one man. Aiden knows something or Aiden did something that they want kept quiet. Maybe they have tried to find him and failed. Maybe they want us to lead them to him.”
Connor was a conspiracy theorist and shades of doubt entered Kate’s mind. Kate had witnessed Sphere taking extreme actions to further their agenda, but she had been on the team that had worked the mission when Aiden disappeared and she’d never heard or read anything to indicate Aiden had displeased Sphere. If Aiden was alive and Sphere knew it, why the charade of a memorial service? Why not list him as missing in action?
Where the building ended and opened to the airfield, they had a choice. They could continue to race along the perimeter of the building or break away from the building, leaving them in the open until they reached the fence encircling the airfield.
If two agents from Sphere had been sent to track her or return her to the United States, would they have been working alone? Sphere assessed the difficulty and the importance of a mission before assigning operatives. Would they have spent the resources to send teams of agents after her? They knew she’d teamed up with Connor, his reputation legendary and his skill renowned.
“What’s the plan?” Kate asked, checking over her shoulder to see how close the Sphere agents were. She didn’t see them. Were they circling around another way? Would they trap her and Connor in a dead end? Kate wiped at her forehead, the sun and her fear overheating her. The Sphere agents couldn’t shoot at them, not out in the open in a foreign country with a complicated relationship with the United States. Not much comfort, since Sphere agents were taught plenty of ways to kill a person discreetly.
“The plan? Get away from the airport without being shot,” Connor said.
Kate inwardly sighed at his obvious statement. Connor wasn’t big on sharing details. According to what she knew of him, while at Sphere, he’d frequently worked alone. She could see why. At least he had a dry sense of humor that charmed her. “You need to give me more than that.”
“I don’t need to do anything,” Connor said, “except find my brother. You forced this partnership. You’ll have to deal with me as I am.”
“Are you trying to be difficult?” Kate asked.
The pause before he answered told her he was considering her question. “No. I am difficult. I don’t try to be. Didn’t my file tell you I don’t play nice with others?”
How had he known she’d read his file? It was a fair assumption. “You’ll have to learn.”
“You’re withholding information, too,” Connor said. “When you give me what I need, I’ll tell you more about my plan.”
Give him what he needed? He needed to relax a bit and trust her a smidgen.
“You want to trade information?” she asked.
“Tell me what you know about my brother and I’ll tell you how we’ll find him,” Connor said. He grabbed her hand. “But later. We’ve been found. Come on,” Connor said, turning the corner of the building.
Kate didn’t have time to see how close the Sphere agents were. They faced more open space and they ran across the tarmac. A baggage handler en route to a plane shouted at them in Portuguese to stop. They continued to run. When they reached the narrow strip of grass on the far side of the airport, a fence topped with barbed wire prevented them from leaving the airport grounds. “What do we do now?” Kate asked. She wasn’t climbing into the barbed wire. She’d heard of Sphere agents doing extreme things, but she wasn’t an agent. Her threshold for pain was minuscule.
“Look for another way out,” Connor said.
At least he hadn’t suggested taking their chances with the barbed wire.
Cutting through the grass, they followed the fence until it opened into an oncoming stream of cars, buses and taxis moving slowly toward the airport’s departures terminal. Kate felt better being among people. The more people around them, the safer they were. Sphere liked to work in secret.
If the Sphere agents had no other choice, how aggressive would they become to meet their agenda?
Connor’s gaze was sharp as he searched the scene, but his posture was relaxed. She was taking her cues from him. Going up against Sphere alone was a risky, and some would say foolish, decision. Having Connor on her side leveled the playing field.
“How will we avoid them?” Kate asked. The Sphere agents had disappeared from view, meaning they could be anywhere. “Maybe we should go back and explain.”
Connor whirled on her. “Go back?” He brought his face close to hers. “Do you have a death wish? Because we’re beyond playing nice and talking things over. Do you think you can reason with them? They know you’ve betrayed them. Sorry, sweetheart, but you’ve passed the point of return. We’ve got to forge ahead.”
Kate grasped for calm in a swelling sea of fears. He was right. Her throat was tight and her breathing came in shallow breaths. She was all in now.
Chapter 3
Connor knelt and dug through his bag. Removing a knife in a sheath, he slid it into the pocket of his pants.
A knife? “How did you get that